Crossing Paths Unique Union Between Churches Offers Members Combined Worship, Shared Resources

The 20 people seated in two rows of folding chairs watch as the Rev. Gary Jewell gets on his hands and knees on the floor to make a scriptural point to two children. No one thinks it’s unusual.

But the pastor crawling around on the floor during worship isn’t the only thing different about this church. Shalom Fellowship is a yoked congregation that combines the former Shalom United Church of Christ and Spokane Mennonite Fellowship. The group meets for worship in an East Central Seventh-Day Adventist Church and is led by Jewell, an ordained Mennonite pastor.

They call themselves a yoked congregation, says Jewell, although the term “federated church” might be more accurate.

“A yoked church shares pastoral leadership and probably operates under the same roof,” he says, “maybe having separate worships, but they’re sharing a lot of the resources.”

A federated church also shares pastoral leadership but has a combined worship service while maintaining different denominational ties.

The unique union began in 1990. Shalom United Church of Christ and the Spokane Mennonite Fellowship both found themselves with small, struggling congregations and the Mennonite church had been without a pastor.

When it first joined, the yoked congregation was led by the Rev. Ray Keeble, who had been the pastor of Shalom UCC. He retired in 1992 and now serves as pastor emeritus. “He’s still involved and he fills a lot of pastoral duties when I’m not around,” says Jewell.

Now between 20 and 30 people from the two congregations meet at 10 a.m. each Sunday for a combined worship service, where Jewell uses worship books from both denominations. Once a year people renew their membership and specify which denomination they belong to.

“I think identity is important,” explains Jewell. “If somebody says `I’m both,’ it’s almost the same as saying `I’m neither’ to me.

“Nobody really spends a lot of time dwelling on our distinctions or differences. Denominationally, there’s a difference, but with … this little group that meets together, it just feels like there’s a real unity.”

That feeling of unity was attractive to member Joanie Eppinga. Raised Presbyterian, she started attending Shalom more than four years ago after shopping around for a church that felt right.

“I like the size,” she says. “I like that fact that it’s informal. It doesn’t feel exclusive theologically.”

She also likes the role children have in the church. On days when she is unable to attend, Eppinga’s daughter begs her mother to find her a ride to church.

“I really like the way children are embraced by the congregation,” she says.

The tiny congregation of Shalom Fellowship doesn’t have many children, but Jewell says he likes making them a part of the service.

Their small size also creates some challenges, says Jewell. “We don’t offer a lot of programs,” he says. “You can’t come and be anonymous very easily. It’s always an issue when you’re small like that - how do we present ourselves in a welcoming manner?”

The two denominations share common beliefs, says Jewell, including a tradition of congregational autonomy. “The UCC have a fairly strong concern for progressive political issues,” he says, “including a lot of peace and justice issues that they hold in common concern with the Mennonites.”

There are also differences between the two, as can be seen in their roots. “The Mennonites and the UCC came off very different branches of the Protestant story,” says Jewell. “Mennonites go back to right at the beginning of the reformation in the 1520s.”

But the Mennonites, then called Anabaptists, didn’t think Martin Luther went far enough in his reforms. They also believed in the adult baptism of believers, which was seen as heresy by Catholics and Lutherans, says Jewell.

“Theologically, the Mennonites are a little more conservative and traditional.”

The UCC is a fairly new denomination, forming in 1957 as the union of two Protestant denominations: the Evangelical and Reformed Church and the Congregational Christian Church. Each of those denominations had, in turn, been formed by the merger of two other denominations.

Despite the similarities of the denominations, Jewell finds himself caught between the two, a sometimes frustrating task. “I like to offend both conservatives and liberals,” he laughs. “I feel sometimes that I’m viewed in UCC circles as fairly conservative, and yet in certain Mennonite circles I feel kind of the opposite.”

When he tells people that he leads a yoked congregation, he often gets asked how he makes that work. “The UCC has been doing stuff like that for a long time,” he says. “It’s not as troubling or strange to them as it might be to the Mennonites, who have a stronger self identity than UCC’s. Ecumenism and cooperation among different groups has been one of their distinctions from the get-go.”

Although Eppinga counts herself as a Mennonite, she doesn’t think the denominational differences matter. “I don’t see it being a problem at all,” she says. “Both congregations are alike in being peace oriented and taking action to make the world a better place.”

Many of the people in Shalom Fellowship are involved in the community, says Jewell, either in their professional careers or as volunteers. They also do their part as a congregation, helping serve meals at the soup kitchen at St. Ann’s Roman Catholic Church.

Shalom also recently teamed with Grace Lutheran Church to offer an after-school tutoring program for children in the neighborhood. The program starts in March, and Jewell is still hoping to recruit some of the other churches in the East Central neighborhood.

The road Jewell took to come to this position included a lot of twists and turns. A native to the Boise area, he was raised in the Presbyterian church. While attending Whitworth College in Spokane, he was invited to attend a Mennonite gathering.

“I felt welcome,” he says. “I was intrigued by their slant on what it means to be a Christian.”

Despite the fact that he had been using his college years to explore different churches, Jewell says he didn’t really have a problem with the Presbyterian faith. “I don’t think I felt a great deal of restlessness about the Presbyterians,” he says. “It was just a part of my cultural experience growing up.”

He graduated from Whitworth in 1982 and joined the Spokane Mennonite Fellowship in 1983. In 1988, he decided to attend the Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Indiana, but he had no plans to become a pastor.

“I wanted to do some theological studies and that’s what drew me originally to AMBS,” he says. “I wanted to study it within the context of tradition.

“I was interested in their peace theology, how they understand this concept of non-violence and peace from the perspective of the Bible.”

After a year of study, he switched to the Master of Divinity Program. “I wasn’t originally sure if that was my calling,” he says. After a one-year internship in Canada, he decided it was what he wanted to do. After graduating in 1992, he returned to Spokane and Shalom Fellowship. He worked with Keeble until he retired, then took over leadership of the combined congregation.

“I suppose my vision in working with these two denominations as one congregation would be to form a community of faith which is both progressive in outlook and evangelical in spirit,” he says. “Shalom Church as a congregation is quite diverse in perspective and doesn’t fit any stereotypical Mennonite or UCC mold.”